A Different Sort of Life
by starrycynic
Summary: Mulder leads Scully off to investigate crop circles in Kansas and inadvertently, the dynamics of their complex interaction. Set in early Season 6 of The X Files, just after "Triangle".
1. Chapter 1

_**A Different Sort of Life 1/4 - X Files fic**_

Title: A Different Sort of Life (1/4)  
Author: Wendy.  
Email:  
Disclaimer: I am not Chris Carter and never will be. It's all his.  
Summary: Mulder leads Scully off to investigate crop circles in Kansas and inadvertently the dynamics of their complex interaction. Set in early Season 6 of The X Files, just after "Triangle".  
Rating: Low on the blush-o-meter.

A Different Sort of Life 1/4

It is 4 in the morning and Mulder is thinking. Some old movie is on the TV and he is unable to sleep. The couch feels lumpier than it should. He shifts his body into sitting and pulls the rug over him. He thinks maybe the heating went off because his apartment is freezing cold. He does not bother to move. It doesn't matter.

He wonders what Scully is doing. He is worried that she is mad at him, but he doesn't know why she should be. She had dropped him home from the hospital late last night, making sure he was settled with water, painkillers and warm clothes before scuttling off for home. She hadn't said much. Just the usual "Get some rest, Mulder" before she shut the door, leaving him alone with a head full of questions. What really happened on the Queen Anne? Why wouldn't she believe him? And if he was just hallucinating, why does his jaw hurt like hell?

He doesn't think that he will be getting any answers tonight.

Again he reruns his patchy memory of the last 24 hours. He had awoken in a hospital bed alone. His first thought had been of Scully, then a burning need for water. He had reached with clumsy hands for the jug, his fingers feeling like indistinct blurs of flesh. The jug had clattered downwards. He had startled at the chill of the water seeping through the sheets into his skin. Memories of the ship and Nazis and Scully, "I'll never see you again" rushed and jumbled in his brain.

"Nurse!"

But Scully had not come. Or Frohike or Langly or Byers. The nurse had said he needed his rest and that his visitors would see him later. Later had come and Scully's gentle censures and Skinner's angry boss man words had been his touchstone reality as he ebbed in and out of consciousness. Lips on his, soft and shocked, sharp, fast blow to the jaw. His whispered "I love you" to Scully. What was real, what was not, he did not know. He doesn't know now. He wishes he did.

His hands wander to the phone and now he is dialling her number. Ring, ring, ring, ring and she picks up. He sighs, a gentle puff of air, relief spreading slowly through him. He didn't think she would answer.

"Mulder? Is that you?"

He realises he has not yet spoken. "Yeah, it's me. I couldn't sleep."

He hears a catch in her voice and a sharp rustle of sheets that he imagines means she has sat up quickly. "Mulder, are you okay?"

"I think so."

"You think so?"

"Mmmhmmm."

"Mulder, the Demerol is still in your system."

He laughs, short and loud. He hears a soft tut of disapproval from the other end of the phone.

"Scully, have you ever wondered about alternate realities?"

"Not really." He frowns. Maybe it shows in a slight dip in his breathing, because she continues with more enthusiasm. "There's the idea of multiverses; that our observable universe is only a part of the entire physical reality. So hypothetically, I'd have to allow for the possibility that other universes exist."

"So you're open to the idea that there can be shifts in time, that multiple realities can co-exist alongside our reality and that all we have to do to see these other worlds is to find a tear in the space-time continuum?"

"Like you say you did on the Queen Anne?"

He doesn't answer.

"Come on, Mulder. You can't seriously believe that you went back in time to the 1940s and single-handedly saved us all from the Nazis. It sounds like something out of 'Quantum Leap'."

"I didn't say that I single-handedly…" He dries up, running out of steam. "You were there, Scully."

There is a crackle of silence, then her voice comes warm and breathy. "Sure I was, Mulder. Now get some sleep and I'll see you tomorrow."

The connection clicks off and he's left listening to the monotonous shrill of the dial tone. He places the handset back and lies back down. He's still cold and the couch is lumpy. The X Files are out of his hands and his partner thinks he's on crack. He turns onto his side and pulls the rug up to his face. Oh well. He'll face that problem later.

Sleep creeps upon him and he accepts it. It is a gift only Demerol can bring.

He wakes early for a Sunday. It is a little past seven am and soft rain is pattering against his window. Little rivulets of water dance and twirl across the glass making intricate and sparkling patterns, before plummeting dramatically into freefall en route to their doom on the window sill's edge. Raindrops lived short but adrenaline-filled lives. He kind of envies them.

The needs of his bladder make themselves known, and he reluctantly pulls himself up off the couch, heading heavy-limbed towards the bathroom. Once the mission is complete, the world of the living has descended on him and he is now fully awake. His brain neurons spark determinedly and he is hungry for the next big chase. He remembers a post on a newsgroup about UFO activity in Kansas. The race is now on to find out more.

After hours spent on the computer, he is ready. He runs out of the door, ready to rendezvous with his latest source. This could be a big one. The phone rings and rings. The answer machine clicks on. His laconic voice rolls across the empty apartment. "This is Fox Mulder. Please leave a message."

"Hi… Mulder, it's me. You're not in so I assume you're better." There is a big pause. "Well, um, I'll see you tomorrow."

He returns back late, way past the early hours and the blinking light on the answer machine fails to catch his eye. Research mode is where he is and where he remains for a long, long time.

He listens to the answer machine, finally, when he realises that he has not heard from Scully. He glances at his watch and sees it is almost 6am. He cusses softly. It's time for him to go to work.

_Monday._

He arrives at their crappy open-plan, on-view-to-all office early, with a spring in his step. He throws his briefcase onto the desk, not caring that it scatters Scully's meticulous report of their latest fertiliser investigation into messy disarray. He has a new case. That's all he is thinking of right now.

Anyway, he has found the perfect way to link it to huge piles of manure and thus avoid another incurrence of Kersh's wrath. And Scully's. She is the last person he wants to annoy right now. He needs her on this one.

Lights in the sky in Kansas. It could be UFO activity, it could be some freak refraction of light, but it doesn't explain the crop circles or the source who claims to have been aboard the mother ship. Mulder has been around the block enough times to be sceptical of this, but he knows that without Scully's strict science he'll be off out on a limb without a leg to stand on – or some such crappy cliché he's mixing all to hell. But the point is that she'll keep him honest; she won't let him sacrifice the truth for some quick fix answer. And if this is a load of manure, Scully's help will let him know.

He sets off in search of a 402, determined to play the case for a simple investigation to verify that fertiliser is not being used for nefarious purposes such as homemade bombs. There are an abundance of farms, a large amount of fertiliser and best of all, it's Kansas, far, far away from the all-seeing eyes of Kersh. He and Scully should be free to explore the extreme possibilities that this case may offer. After a month with nothing but waste product, a talking cow would be a highlight.

He enters Kersh's office, his best poker-face on display. "Sir, I would like to request permission to investigate a case in Kansas, involving a farmer's purchase of vast amounts of fertiliser."

Kersh stares at him balefully, his eyes narrowing. Mulder's expression does not flicker. "And what would interest you so much about a big pile of manure, Agent Mulder? Last thing I heard, you were above such investigations."

Hot anger pools in Mulder's gut. He balls his hands into fists, muscles tightening and twisting at the slur. Kersh smirks, the catty reaction of a man who knows he has all the power. The knowledge bolsters Mulder and calm flows through him, spiriting the anger away. He will never let them win.

"Agent Scully and I have reason to believe, following our research, that this man, Charles Colwyn," skimming a series of records, reports and ID photographs across the desk to Kersh, "has purchased a huge quantity of fertiliser for reasons not related to farming. A number of factors, such as the time of year and the identified low ratio of arable to non-arable farming activities taking place on Mr Colwyn's property, would indicate the need for checks to be made to ensure the legitimacy of Mr Colwyn's use of fertiliser."

Kersh glances over the evidence that Mulder has presented him with and then thrusts it back towards him. "Looks like you have yourself a case, Agent."

Mulder nods, retrieving the papers from the desk and preparing to make his retreat. But Kersh hasn't finished with him yet. "I'll be watching you. You and Agent Scully."

Mulder lifts his chin defiantly and walks out. "That'll be fun," he mutters under his breath.

When he arrives back at his desk, Scully is there. He greets her with a mischievous grin.

"What?" She is already suspicious. He disarms her with a stack of case paperwork, which she takes with a disgruntled ommmph.

"We're off to Kansas, Scully." She scans the top page of the paperwork and looks back up at him. Her eyebrows raise and her mouth is hard set. Convincing her will not be easy. "Fertiliser and more fertiliser wait for no man."

"Mulder, it's a hay farm. In Kansas… at the tail-end of fall."

He grins. "And your point is?"

She puts the paperwork down on the desk. "Why do I have the feeling fertiliser is the last thing this is about?"

"Because of our stellar communication skills, garnered from six years of partnership?"

She shakes her head and stands, looking at him expectantly. "Start by communicating what this case is all about and then we'll see."

He leads her from the office, beginning to explain, but he knows he's already got her. She's too damn curious not to follow a lead and too loyal to abandon him; and as exasperated as hell that he knows all this and how to use it to his advantage, without her being able to do a thing about it. Being a psychological profiler sure has its advantages some days.

Scully's annoyance is transient today. Her quiet smile lets him know that he is forgiven. He basks in its warmth. There is no woman on this earth who can smile as simply as Scully. No woman whose smile is so rare.

He hopes this trip to Kansas will offer them both more opportunities for smiling. God knows they could both do with a slice of the lighter side of life.


	2. Chapter 2

_**A Different Sort of Life 2/4**_  
Title: A Different Sort of Life (2/4)  
Author: Wendy.  
Email:  
Disclaimer: I am not Chris Carter and never will be. It's all his.  
Summary: Mulder leads Scully off to investigate crop circles in Kansas and inadvertently the dynamics of their complex interaction. Set in early Season 6 of The X Files, just after "Triangle".  
Rating: Low on the blush-o-meter.

A Different Sort of Life 2/4

_En route to Lawrence City, Kansas._

Scully is sleeping in the car. Her head is lolling gently to the side and her mouth is slightly parted. She looks peaceful. Mulder has been driving for twenty minutes now, mile after mile of sleek black road disappearing under his wheels in a hypnotic drone as he journeys on, and he longs for the sweet distraction of conversation with Scully. But he won't wake her, no matter how great the temptation becomes. He enjoys watching her sleep far more. And his opportunities to do this uninterrupted are few indeed.

They had been lucky enough to get an early afternoon flight. They had first flown to Chicago and then caught a connecting flight to Kansas. It had taken a little over four hours – much better than the five plus hours it could have been with any other connection. Not that it mattered to Mulder. He has plenty to do, reviewing "UFO activity" data collected by local enthusiasts and the grainy photos of crop circles on Charles Colwyn's farm. Whatever Charles Colwyn will make of all this, Mulder doesn't know. He will find out soon enough.

The sky is dark with clear, crystal point stars glittering above like strewn confetti. He finds his mind slipping into thoughts of times past, when he and Samantha would run wild and free along the beach at Quonochautaug, yelling and hollering as loud as the crash of the surf. They had sat out on nights like these, wishing on stars and telling ghost stories until Samantha called him "buttmunch", threatening to cry if he didn't stop scaring her and only the almost-cry of "MOM!" was the settler of that argument. A familiar aching emotion swells in him and his throat feels tight and dry, as if someone has stuffed it with cottonwool. He doesn't want to do this here. Not now. He can't be vulnerable when the truth could be so near and he has no where to hide from Scully's razorsharp eyes. He swallows quickly, gulp and gulp, and at last there is freedom and air flowing freely in and out of his lungs. He feels he is safe for now.

Beside him, Scully stirs. She sits up slowly, running her hands down her hair. "Sorry, Mulder. I promised I'd keep you company."

"That's okay…" There is a twinkle in his eye. "I was just listening to your very musical snores."

"I do not snore."

He glances at her. She is indignant, but there is a hint of embarrassment about her tight-lipped grimace. He can't resist. "Is that right? Maybe it was a very nasal whispering of my name I could hear."

Her eyebrows now rise in a cutting but unthreatening glare. She folds her hands neatly in her lap. "That would be in your dreams, Mulder, I think you'll find," she says. "But as I rarely remember my dreams, I guess we'll never know for sure."

He laughs shortly, wishing the banter wasn't so obviously closed. He loves to see Scully react to his innuendos, hoping that beyond the lightness and the teasing retorts he will see something deeper. Their shuffle-steps back and forth frequently skirt close to the dividing line, but they have never ever crossed it and moved into something more. Oh, it's been close and oh-so close, before bees and Antarctic adventures interfered and now he worries he has missed his chance. The memory of a rejected "I love you" burns in his memory and now he knows it is real. He can't take the risk of losing her by trying again.

"Mulder?" Her face is poised as if waiting, and he realises he has been staring. It's an occupational hazard of being around someone who head trips him like Scully.

"I was just thinking about the universe," he says. "About how it started, how we started. How the stars were created and the planets."

Scully stares out into the night sky. Pale moonlight casts her face in a soft glow. "All that time the starlight travels." She is murmuring almost to herself. "I don't think we as humans are meant to comprehend the idea of infinity. Time for us is fast or slow, slotted into small, easily catalogued chunks. The idea of time stretching forever… it's almost surreal."

He grins gently. "Like an extreme possibility."

She turns from the sky to look at him. "Maybe." Even in this light he can see the whimsy curling her expression into something soft and intangible.

"Then maybe we're not so far apart in our beliefs as we thought."

He expects a look of contradiction, or at the very least a firm pressing of her lips. Instead she simply smiles.

Sometimes Dana Scully is full of extreme possibilities. She is an X File all of her own.

"What?" The word has an underlying sharpness that demands an answer. He obeys.

"Sometimes you surprise me, Scully."

She settles back into her seat and closes her eyes. "Good."

He doesn't answer, eyes returning strictly to the road. He will let this go for now. He has caused her to lose enough sleep just lately after the Queen Anne debacle.

They pass a road sign and he sees that Lawrence is close. A crackle of excitement surges in him. Tomorrow he will be able to begin the investigation officially. For tonight, he has other ideas. Much less official ones. What Kersh doesn't know, he can't haul up their asses for.

He will settle Scully at the motel first, ensure she is comfortable and making steady inroads into her sleep debt, and then check out the fields of Charles Colwyn's farm. If there is anything for her to see, he will show her tomorrow under the assumption of fertiliser fraud. Yeeha!

He can't wait.

~~

_Motel, just outside of Lawrence City, Kansas._

Finally she is asleep and he is out of the room, sliding behind the wheel of their rental car. A quick twist of the key and the ignition is started. His hand reaches for the gear, ready to go, but he hears the light crunch of gravel and looks up. Scully stares back at him.

"Mulder, where are you going?" Her voice is grouchy with disturbed sleep, a distinct sign of danger for anyone in her sights. Mulder begins to feel like a marked man.

He quickly weighs up his options, considering lies and excuses, but the unforgiving glare in her eye brings it all into perspective. To err now is to do the unthinkable: to alienate Scully from him and his quest. He cannot forget why she is here. "I was going to check out Colwyn's farm."

Her lips twist, an angry, irritated knot that shows no signs of going away. "And you were going to go without me." And there is another word, one that she may not say, but it is clear in her eyes all the same – 'again'.

His mouth opens and out comes a stutter-stutter breath. He doesn't know what to say to make this right. She sighs heavily and turns, beginning to walk away.

Panic sets in and he flings open the door. "Get in, Scully." She hesitates, the hurt still there. He beckons slightly. "Come on. Let's go see some crop circles."

She gets into the car, her posture stiff and formal. She avoids eye contact neatly. He starts up the car quickly before she can change her mind. He has a lot of work to do. "You know I just wanted to make sure there was something to investigate."

He approaches the subject gingerly, glancing at her to gauge her reaction. She remains erect, her bearing as distant and regal as any royalty's could be. The outcome is not to be good.

"I would have hoped you would have ensured that before dragging me out halfway across the country."

He takes a more playful tack. "Where's your sense of adventure, Scully?"

"Arguably, wherever you left your actual sense."

He shrugs, shaking his head. Short, sharp retorts mean he is getting no where and he is too tired tonight to persist in winning her over. His charm will erode the steep walls of resistance eventually, but there will be no overall assault on Castle Scully tonight.

"Scully, did I ever tell you how much more enriching your presence is when you're crabby and overtired." A cheap shot, he knows, but he's past caring.

"Mulder," she says. He looks over at her questioningly. "I'm armed."

A sly smile curls across his lips and he slides the gear into drive. There's a slight upsurge of triumph as he pulls away from the lot, the wheels spinning roughly over the gravel. He's got her back. The breath of relief catches in his throat, doubt suddenly hovering. He glances over at her. The headlights skim across the road, refracting jagged shards of light across the planes of her face. She is facing forward, stone-faced, no flicker of amusement on lips nor eyes. He amends his previous estimate… Yeah, he's got her back alright. Sort of.

They pass the rest of the short ride in silence, Mulder negotiating the car down the darkened roads to Colwyn's farm, waiting for her exterior to crack. He knows from experience that this could be a long wait.

He sees the sign for Colwyn's farm ahead and swiftly pulls off the road. The car jerks to a stop, propelling them into an uneasy snap back of seatbelt and limbs. Scully lets out a hiss of surprise, pushing herself back in her seat, and clicks off the seatbelt, rubbing her chest where it has caught. Finally she turns to him. "Was that strictly necessary?"

"I'm sorry, Scully." He looks at the spot her hand is shielding. "Are you okay?"

She nods. "I'll be fine."

The familiar feeling of uneasiness creeps upon him at the emergence of her idiosyncratic response. How many times has she said this to him when her world was falling apart, when solace and comfort were all she needed? How many times has she kept him away with an automatic lie? He flicks on the overhead light and reaches for the map. He can't start thinking about this now.

One quick look at the map reassures him that they are in the right spot. He switches off the light and grabs the small backpack from the backseat. "Scully, I always thought that moonlit flits were kind of romantic."

She offers him a restrained smile. "Too bad we're only here for the crop circles."

He half-grins, looking at her wryly as he slides out of the car. "All work and no play makes Scully a dull girl." The door clicks shut with a push from his hip.

She gets out of the car, and flicks on her flashlight, pointing it at Mulder's face. He blinks in the harsh glare. "Who said anything about no play?"

His lips part slightly, the only reaction he can make; the shock of a Scully entendre has rooted him to the spot. He can only watch as she pushes the door shut and begins hiking across the field. "What are you waiting for, Mulder?" Her call echoes playfully across the field and his limbs suddenly have energy and vigour again. He throws the backpack on his shoulder and jogs after her.

"I do believe we've found your sense of adventure," he says, as he catches her up, his hand coming to rest lightly on the small of her back. She relaxes back into it, her head nestling closer to his shoulder for a small, fleeting moment. He allows his eyes to close. One perfect moment and he isn't going to let it go.

"Don't doubt it."

"Not for a second." His voice is softer, more wistful than he had intended. He opens his eyes and finds her looking at him, her expression tentative and unsure. He puts his hand on hers and strokes lightly, before tugging her gently forward. "Let's go find ourselves an adventure."

They amble onwards together, the air of a carefree, youthful jaunt in their step. He can't remember the last time they smiled like this, the last time she allowed him to touch her without tension or worse, fear. The wind tousles her hair, a wild, unruly scatter of hair that Scully does nothing to tuck back, and he's glad that she lets him see this side of her. The unedited, pure form of Scully that only the silence of her solitude is allowed a glimpse before she prepares for the world again. The thought "she's beautiful" comes but he lets it go, lets it flitter away in the wind like dandelion fairies and memories of pleasanter times. It's easier now, so much easier: say nothing, ignore it, go on and pretend that nothing is different, nothing has changed. He's practised every second since she tried to walk away from him in the hallway, since they came back from Antarctica and their bond and togetherness seemed to slowly leach away. He pitches his tone to casual, to somewhere between partners, friends and something else, cracks a joke and keeps the twinge of regret from bleeding him dry. If only there hadn't been a bee, if only there hadn't been Antarctica, if only he hadn't gone with Diana and left Scully out in the cold…. Too many if onlys and he knows his mask is slipping. Caution pushes him to a quick, surreptitious study of her. He waits and watches, knowing the signs – furrowed brow, distant look in eyes, lips pressed tightly. At last he knows. She hasn't noticed, he thinks, she's still smiling.

He thinks of the Scully smiles he has seen over the years. The tight lipped grin to his teasing, the sarcastic smirk when she gets her revenge, the happy, unchecked real smile of cancer in remission, the wide-mouthed laughing Scully that he met on their first case. He loves how the serious composure of her face can slip into something so free and unexpected, can soften and mould itself into comfort or joy, laughter or tears. She can be so many things, have so many layers, yet she is constant, a nearby presence he knows he can phone in the middle of the night, knows he can rely on her to drop all her plans and follow him to the end of the earth. He doesn't always understand why she follows him, why she stays, but he knows he is glad that she does. He couldn't do this without her, couldn't imagine a morning where she didn't scoff at his theories or argue with him about whose turn it is to do their case expenses. He couldn't imagine anything without her anymore.

"Mulder?" He startles and looks up at her, the closeness and realness of her face jolting him from abstract thoughts. "I think we've found your crop circles."

He follows the line of her sight, and sees a dip in the hay. "Yep, I think so." His source had told him to expect the first of the circles about a mile into the fields. It seems that that information at least is correct.

He directs the flashlight at the circle and walks into it, Scully close behind, her flashlight criss-crossing with his. They form a two-prong attack, diverging out to cover the full circle. "There's some sort of spiral pattern emanating from the centre of the elliptical perimeter." He lets his footsteps spiral around and around until he has traced its shape and knows finally that this is the real thing, a carbon copy of the phenomena he has studied. "Scully, there is no way this thing could have been fabricated."

Scully shines the flashlight in a downward arc towards him, illuminating him for an instant in a bright flare of brilliant light. "There's no proof of that. The only evidence we have is a big elliptical area of flattened hay. So there's a pattern inside it. A very intricate pattern, I will concede. That doesn't mean anything, Mulder."

He grips her hand, and pulls her around the perimeter of the flattened hay. They twist and turn in a dance of tip and lift, dip and rise, believer and sceptic, all over again. "Come on, Scully. See the absolute symmetry of the design, see the way it's so precise, so perfect." His flashlight flicks over the circle excitedly. "The north half is flattened away from us and the south is flattened towards us. I can't wait to document this fully!" He bends down to examine the shaft of hay. "The shaft is somehow softened but otherwise undamaged." She looks on, unimpressed. "It could only have been achieved through superior technology."

She shakes her head and pulls her hand free. "Aliens, Mulder?" He gives her a "what else could it be?" look. "I refuse to believe that. Why would beings of a supposedly advanced civilisation waste their time cutting holes in a hay field?"

The buoyancy of his discovery sinks down in the razor-sharp teeth of her rationality. Why indeed? But then he remembers probes and scars, implants and retro-viruses she didn't believe in either until she saw the proof and he wants to believe, and more than anything, he wants her to believe too.

"Come on, Scully. You can't deny the need to communicate, the need to reach out and represent our existence, our whole essence to life in the universe. Look at the Voyagers. The need we had to place something of ourselves, our humanity and diversity into spacecrafts that would traverse further than any manmade object into the reaches of space." She is frowning slightly at him, but the upwards incline of her chin, the spark of challenge in her crossed arms gives him hope she hasn't closed her mind yet. "Is it really so fantastical to believe that other such beings would share the same longings, that they would want to meet us just as badly as we want to meet them?"

She steps out of the circle and squats down, taking her head into her hands. She looks tired. "I just don't get why this is important. I don't see what this has to do with the whole picture."

"Scully…" His voice is a soft interjection, but she continues. There is no stopping her now.

"I don't think I even know what the big picture is anymore. We chase these random cases, travel thousand and thousands of miles, always looking for a truth that we never seem to find. Why do we do it, Mulder? Why do I do it?"

He stares at her, words lost and gone to him. He can no longer remember why he is here, why he thought this would be a good idea. The night is dissolving into a series of noughts and ones, binary code rendering tone and light into meaningless blurs. Sound, familiar to him over years crackles and the world zones back in to one small red headed woman standing in a field of hay.

Scully is still talking. "Sometimes I just want to know there will be an end to it. That's all."

Her eyes are wide, her hands knotted together in an intricate pattern he wants to run a finger along, let it whirl and glide along the soft, warm skin he knows he will find. He reaches out and touches her hands with one of his. "Scully, you are the only one I can trust in this."

She lets her hands meld with his. "I just want to know we aren't chasing our tails, going round and round without end."

He can't make that promise to her. His answer is a squeeze of her hand. "Help me investigate these crop circles, Scully."

There is a sudden whoosh of sound and they both look up. He sees a bright beam of light coming towards them and for a brief, wonderful moment he thinks that it's finally come, the big kahuna, the massive mother ship of all time to give them their incontrovertible proof. The light clears and there's a whir of wings, the gleaming black body of a helicopter clear in his sight. His response is automatic.

"Scully, run!"

He tugs her with him, running and running, battling against the hay, trampling it beneath his feet, not caring as long as he can feel her hand in his. She is trundling behind him like a ragdoll, nothing but his onward momentum keeping her going, and he is scared that if he stops, she will too and it will all be over.

"Come on, Scully," he yells. She grunts, pain in the groan, aching legs and chest tight with exertion. He tugs harder, dragging, forcing her along. He keeps going full tilt until the air is flung from his lungs, his leg muscles jar, and he falls to the ground bringing Scully down with him.

He listens. A cricket chirps. Wind rustles through the hay. No loud droning of helicopter wings bearing down upon them, no gunfire shooting after their asses. Scully's weight presses against him as she shifts upon the ground. He hears the soft pant of her breathlessness, but she is here. She is safe.

"Mulder?" He looks up at her. "You okay?"

He brushes the hair back out of her eyes. "Yeah."

"What the hell was that helicopter doing?"

Pulling himself to his feet, he looks back at the now empty sky. "Good question."

He begins to walk slowly towards the road where they left their car. Scully's footsteps echo behind him, dull and heavy now. He knows that she feels the same suspicion he does, feels the sinister press of conspiracy and darkness they have been locked in for far too long. Laughter and intimacy are a fading memory; joie de vivre is gone.

He accepts the inevitable. He is Mulder; she is Scully. This is their life.

Their investigation has truly begun.

He just can't remember why he should care.


	3. Chapter 3

_**A Different Sort of Life 3/4**_  
Title: A Different Sort of Life (3/4)  
Author: Wendy.  
Email:  
Disclaimer: I am not Chris Carter and never will be. It's all his.  
Summary: Mulder leads Scully off to investigate crop circles in Kansas and inadvertently the dynamics of their complex interaction. Set in early Season 6 of The X Files, just after "Triangle".  
Rating: Low on the blush-o-meter.

A Different Sort of Life 3/4

Mulder pushes the door open and they stumble inside Scully's room. They both stand for a moment, looking at each other, a continuation of the silence they have shared since Scully asked about the helicopter. He wonders if it will last forever. Then Scully's hand snakes past him to shut the door and finally she speaks.

"Mulder, take a shower. You look beat."

He attempts a tired grin. "Gee, Scully. You're saying I stink?"

She plucks a piece of hay from the shoulder of his jacket. "No, Mulder. I'm saying you need a shower."

He shakes his head softly, thinking same thing, Scully, you're saying the exact same thing, and walks towards the bathroom. On a half whim, he turns back and points towards the bathroom invitingly, raising his eyebrows. Scully declines with a "no way" grimace. For some reason, he finds that amusing and the laughter pours from him, unchecked by Scully's look of surprise as he shuts the bathroom door behind him or the hot burning spray of water on his skin in the shower. The laughter fades and he finds he is shaking, a strange kind of weakness coming over him that has him gripping the tiled wall. He hears Scully knocking, calling him, but the shaking does not stop. The water is running cold and Scully is in the bathroom, shutting off the shower and ushering him out.

"Mulder, you need to get dry."

He follows, letting her wrap him in a towel. She looks at his shaking body. "You're exhausted."

"I'm okay," he creaks out. "Really."

"You're not, Mulder," she answers, swiftly rubbing his body dry. "It's not that long since you were dragged from the ocean and hospitalised. I should never have let you come back to work so soon."

He sighs. He will not let her blame herself for this. "You could never have stopped me, Scully."

There is a lull while she finishes drying him and bundles him up in the motel's complimentary robe. She gently pushes him through the door and encourages him to lie down on her bed. "I know that."

Good, he thinks, closing his eyes. He feels the bed dip as Scully sits beside him, her hand resting lightly on his arm. He is glad she is here.

"Mulder, why do you think that helicopter was there tonight?"

The question surprises him and his eyes open again. "I don't know, Scully. But I know we've seen those types of helicopters before and it has never been good."

She is quiet for a little while and he guesses that beyond the silent façade, her mind is buzzing. It doesn't take too much of a leap to know what about.

"You're guessing that it's something to do with the conspiracy?" she asks.

"I'm thinking it could be."

"Then we'd be thinking the same thing."

She looks down at him. Her eyes are suddenly alive with the chase for knowledge, energising and fulfilling her. It is like a switch has been flicked and in the brilliance of the light all her frustrations and doubts about their work have withered away. He doesn't know what has changed but it is something fundamental, crucial. Something he dare not question. He waits for her to speak.

"I just don't know where you think the crop circles figure into all of this or why that helicopter would be so interested in them. Or even if it was," she says. "There are a lot of unasked questions here that I'd like to quiz Mr Colwyn about."

"Like when he noticed someone was playing etch-a-sketch in his hay fields," he suggests.

She lies back on the bed, her arms crossed across her chest. Her body is close to his but not quite touching. "That'd be a good start. But we'll have to be careful."

"We will be," he says, nudging his leg against hers. She relaxes a little, letting her arms fall to her sides. Her breaths are slow and steady, strumming down towards sleep. He feels his own exhaustion pinch.

"Mulder?"

He rolls over on his side and looks at her expectantly. Her eyes are half-closed in a drowsy hobbling between waking and sleep. "Goodnight, Mulder."

"Night," he murmurs and flicks off the bedside lamp.

Tonight, he falls asleep straightaway.

~~

He wakes briefly in the night. From the lamps in the parking lot, a sliver of stark halogen light falls across the room, casting the room in a pale glow. He feels Scully twitching beside him, arms battling weakly. Strange gurgling noises come from her throat, almost as if she is choking. He turns and shakes her.

"Scully, Scully," he says, gently clutching at her arms. There is no response other than rasped gagging and the trembling of her body.

"Wake up." His voice is stronger, louder, his grip on her arms increasing as the gurgles become more strangled and her body becomes stiller. "Come on, Scully. Wake up."

The sounds stop and her eyes fly open. For a moment, there is blind terror as she stares up at him. He clings to her tighter. "It's okay. It's okay."

He waits, still holding her. Slowly recognition dawns, sleepy confusion creeping across her features. "What's going on?"

"You had a bad dream," he says, gradually releasing her from his grasp and letting her settle. She murmurs "Oh", her eyes already fluttering shut, and he places a soft kiss to her forehead.

He wonders whether she will remember the dream tomorrow, when she rarely recalls them. Is this a dream she would want to remember? He does not know. The thoughts swirl in his mind until his eyes close and he is asleep again.

~~

Mulder pulls up the car, adjusting his sunglasses as he looks up at the wooden shack of a house shrinking back from the dusty ground. It's like a deserted town scene from an old Western movie. Can anyone really live here? He almost expects a tumbleweed to trundle past, or to see the ghost of some vigilante cowboy swing up to defend his turf. Instead there is Scully, gazing at him curiously. She is armed but sadly without a cowboy hat.

"Coming, Mulder?"

"Yeah," he mutters, pushing the image of a Stetson-wearing Scully firmly from his mind. Too many other images went with that one, running and running until he has his own full colour, all singing, all dancing montage playing in the Mulder special performance screenroom. This is a show better enjoyed alone rather than in the company of the one person he can't afford to share it with. He blinks behind his shades, pushing his hands together in a steeple. Composure will come to those who wait.

They exit the car. He walks solicitously behind Scully, a guiding hand on the small of her back. He is Mulder; she is Scully. FBI partners. The mantra flipflops and limps, but he presses, thinking procedure, rules, protocol, manure, manure, manure. Reason and rationality siphon from Scully to him, the feel of her firm, upright posture reminding him he is here for a reason. He remembers whooshing helicopters, running fast, wide, open circles of possibility and the rush of questions, wonders, need-to-know-now energy flooding through him.

Scully glances back at him, her hand shading her eyes from the bright flash of sun. There is uncertainty, a need to be reassured, on her face. There is too much at stake to make light, to pretend there's nothing to be concerned about. He catches her eye and smiles suddenly. He is ready.

She is about to speak, but he interrupts. "Hey, Scully?" Her eyebrow lifts. "Are you having 'Little House on The Prairie' flashbacks about now?"

She smirks, but doesn't answer his question. "I don't know, Mulder. This place has a kind of rustic charm."

He looks down at the dirt spattered over his shoes. "If you're into getting down and dirty…."

"Looks like you'll have to dress down a little," she observes, casting a glance at her own immaculate footwear. He looks away, suppressing the urge to grab her and roll her in the dirt, and revel as her controlled demeanour is reduced to dishrags. He could just imagine it now: Scully would be playful, scornful and more than anything, completely ready to kick his ass. Except, he knows that it wouldn't quite work that way; not with the indomitable, unstoppable force that is Scully. It wouldn't be worth the effort. She would just fix him with a withering glance, pick herself up, dust herself down and continue as if nothing had happened. He would be left standing in her wake, slack-jawed and shellshocked, wondering why nothing he says, nothing he does seems to make its mark in the way he wants.

Scully taps his arm lightly and he looks up. A short, stocky man is now coming towards them, his body rammed into a badly fitting cheap suit. He is looking at them with an air of hostility, who the hell are you plastered all over his reddened, plump face. Charles Colwyn, he presumes. Mulder notices his shoes too are coated with the dusty earth. Oh well, he thinks. At least it isn't just him.

"Charles Colwyn?" Scully asks, as the man nears.

"Yes, that's me," Colwyn bellows. "And who would you be and what are you doing on my farm?"

With an ease of practised motion, Scully whips out her badge, flashing it at Colwyn, as she gives him the "Sir, we're Mulder and Scully, FBI" spiel. Mulder shows Colwyn his badge, shutting it quickly before Colwyn can comment on either his first name or his photo ID. Scully, on the other hand, has not been so lucky.

"Why, that's a nice photo, Miss Scully," Colwyn comments, peering closely at her badge.

"Agent Scully," she corrects, snapping the badge shut and snatching it away from Colwyn.

He accepts it with a sour grin, and turns to Mulder. "Bet she's one hell of a handful."

Scully seethes, arms crossed, face fierce. Colwyn has clearly gone too far. Mulder looks down on him sternly, but he knows that the twinkle of mischief is all too evident to Scully from the levity in his monotone. "That would be official FBI business."

"Which," Scully says firmly, taking one step towards Colwyn, "is why we're here."

"Oh?" says Colwyn.

"Sir," she says, hands now on her hips. "We're here to investigate the legitimacy of your recent purchase of a large quantity of manure."

Colwyn shrugs. "Oh, it's that domestic terrorism thing you're interested in. I can assure you that there's nothing but hay here." Scully gives him a look. "Okay, okay, I'll get the documentation."

"Thank you, Sir," she snips and takes off after Colwyn, looking something like a small dogged terrier on his heels. Mulder follows them, wondering what Colwyn will do next to annoy Scully. They've only been here a few minutes and already Colwyn has committed every chauvinistic sin in the book. Mulder reminds himself to ask Colwyn for the name of his charm school and to avoid it like the plague.

Colwyn is ranting. "It's always the same. People always thinking there is something here other than hay and the feckless vandalism of my crop."

Mulder jumps immediately in. "What types of things do they believe are here?"

"You'd have to ask them. Damn UFO nuts stomping all over my farm."

Mulder locks eyes with Scully for a brief, subtle moment. Scully's lips purse. Welcome to the nut brigade, he thinks. You're in damn good company.

"Have you ever seen any strange activity taking place?" Mulder asks, keeping his growing enthusiasm in check. "Any lights in the sky?"

Colwyn tuts, and shakes his head, as he ushers them into his home, shutting the door behind them. Mulder is careful not to comment on Colwyn's less than courteous behaviour. He knows that it wouldn't take much to push them onto really thin ice with this one.

"Or when you noticed the indented patterns in your hay field?"

Colwyn gives Mulder a mocking glance. "Oh, don't tell me you're one of those UFO nuts too."

Mulder keeps his face blank, but is not immune to Scully's raised eyebrow. He pushes down his pride and continues. "Sir, do you remember when the patterns appeared or whether there was any strange activity around the fields around that time?"

As he waits for Colwyn to answer, Scully peers around the darkened living room, with its hardwood floors and sparse scattering of plain, utilitarian furniture. He knows that she is thinking how lonely such a life would be, how a home without soft furnishings and comforts would be no retreat from the world. He has seen the look on her face too many times when she is at his apartment, staring at his sofa-come-bed.

"Probably a couple of months back, around the time all those idiots started turning up on my fields. Other than that, nothing much of anything happens around here. As for lights in the sky… try the moon and stars." Colwyn opens a drawer and pulls out various papers, sorting them into a messy pile on the bureau. "This is Kansas. Nothing freaky goes on here."

"Nothing at all?" Scully asks, taking the papers from Colwyn and scrutinising them thoroughly. There is a sharpness in her voice which puts Mulder on edge. He needs Scully calm, needs Scully to be his focus and compass in this. If she is off kilter, he worries that they both will be.

Colwyn folds his arms and sighs. "What more can I tell you?" Colwyn says. "I've shown you the documentation. Unless you want to see the manure itself…."

Sensing an imminent breakdown of citizen-federal officer relations, Mulder cuts in. "Let's start with a verbal explanation."

Colwyn stutters and starts, burbling out something about his rights as a business man in a free country, but it comes down to the same thing. "I run a hay farm, Agent Mulder. What the heck do you think I want fertiliser for?"

Mulder glances over Scully's shoulder at the paperwork. Everything seems to be in order. There's nothing he can do to prove Colwyn is lying about the helicopters without blowing the fertiliser cover far into the air and covering them both in doodoo. He has the memories to prove how disgusting that scenario would be. But Scully's doubts and his own suspicions niggle and gnaw at his insides. The fire of truth is dimming in his mind's eye, lies obfuscating its brightness and flow. He has been here before with seemingly airtight alibis and evidence vanished without a trace blocking every path to the real answers. This time, he won't let go. He wants an explanation and he wants it now.

"How about we go see it?" Mulder stares at Colwyn hard. Colwyn's small eyes narrow.

"I don't think so."

"It wasn't a suggestion, Mr Colwyn." Mulder slides the words out, harsh and low. He edges closer to Colwyn, sensing Scully doing the same. They are tightening the net, keeping the catch in their sights.

"I've had just about enough of this," Colwyn says. "If you want to see the fertiliser so bad, you can both go get a warrant!"

"Please should suffice," Scully snaps, stepping forward. Mulder stills her quickly with a hand to her arm. She looks at him, her eyes flashing, angry and indignant. He shakes his head slightly.

"Your co-operation would be appreciated." Mulder puts on his best Federal Agent tone. Colwyn scowls but relents.

"You'd better follow me."

Scully pushes past Mulder in pursuit of Colwyn, brushing his hand from her arm as if he was a speck of dust. He watches her, his lower lip caught between his teeth. Office politics, he tells himself. It's just office politics. The fact they aren't in the office is a fact he chooses to ignore.

Mulder follows them, Colwyn's constant train of whines and complaints droning over him, non-sensical, endless static that he tunes out. He can only hear the click-clack of Scully's heels, the swish of her coat tails, the whirring speed of thoughts and theories, his and Scully's, twirling and twisting, so he doesn't know which is which anymore. He is in so deep. She turns and looks back at him, the tension pushing between them far and fast. He does the only thing he can and looks away.

They arrive at a large outbuilding. Colwyn produces a key and unlocks the door, throwing it open to reveal the store. "There you go," he says, staring pointedly at Scully. "Have a ball."

She lifts her chin and frowns. Colwyn shrinks away, leaving them alone.

Mulder watches as Scully looks at the paperwork, and then at the stock, carefully checking for any disparities. Her face furrows in concentration, a determination in her eyes that is intense and single-minded. Mulder is acutely aware of how unnecessary he is to her, how self-sufficient and capable she is all on her own. He wishes he could help, could share this with her, but she will not let him. All he can do is observe.

She repeats the cycle several times, eyes between stock and paperwork, examining, scrutinising, until her fingers claw at the paper in frustration. "Damn it," she spits under her breath, almost as if she thinks he won't be able to hear. He murmurs half a word, but it is swallowed by her industry, by the shuffling of papers, the endless steps back and forth. He is hypnotised, lulled into inaction by her rhythmic, monotonous onslaught, knowing there is no end, no beginning, only more papertrails and heartache, disappointment and loss. The circle of life, of time passing, ticktock, ticktock. Her stumble as her heel catches in an abrasion of the cool concrete floor. The efficient rearrangement of limbs and suit. Footsteps starting again. He begs for it to stop.

His voice is gentle, tentative. "Scully, we're not going to find anything here." She doesn't look up. "Scully." His voice is harder, but still no response as she continues her search. His hand grasps her arm and he pulls her around to face him. "It's time to stop."

She shakes her head, pulling her arm free. "No, Mulder," she says. "I know he's hiding something."

"He's not hiding it here."

Scully pushes the paperwork at him and walks out. He notices her brisk nod at Colwyn, his answering look of self-satisfaction. Mulder exits and hands the paperwork to Colwyn.

"All in order then?" Colwyn asks.

Mulder casts a look over Colwyn's shoulder, towards the hay fields. A shadow of something disturbs Colwyn's composed front.

"We'll let you know." Mulder takes his leave sharply, and enjoys the sight of Colwyn in a stew. Just for an instant. A flash of trenchcoat and bright hair shimmers in his peripheral vision. He has more important things to deal with.

He hurries after her, calling her name. She does not slow down. He breaks into a half-jog, half-lunge, and is finally right behind her, his hand about to touch her shoulder, when she halts and faces him. She looks at him. There is no fury; no outrage. Just tiredness.

"Come on, Scully," he jokes. "If you're gonna make me run, at least wait until I'm wearing my sneakers."

Her lips are a thin line of danger, and he is frighteningly close to the precipice. He does not care.

"So it's a huge pile of manure," he says. "What were you expecting it to show you?"

She clenches her fists together. "I don't know. But something. Call it a very strong feeling."

He watches her turn, her back ramrod straight, and begin to walk towards the car. She is in defensive mode and her shields are held high. He thinks that her shoulder muscles must be in knots from the pressure, tight, taut and in desperate need of release. He will do what he can.

"Hey Scully," he calls. She doesn't turn but stops dead, waiting for him. "I sense the connection too. I know there's something he is hiding. You're right to trust your instincts."

Her shoulders sag. "I already knew that, Mulder."

He moves so that he is just behind her, his chest almost touching her back, his mouth a breath from her ear. "So why is this getting to you?"

He feels an increased tension in her and leans in closer, letting his hand rest upon her side as she slots against him. His eyes close, awaiting her verdict. Fearing it, knowing he cannot avoid it forever. Six years has been more than he ever thought he would get.

"I can't talk about this." Her voice is a scant whisper, faint and withering in the intensity of his resolve. He has to know. He will.

"Tell me."

Slowly the genesis of speech rustles in her throat, the words beginning to form, distant and impersonal yet too close to the bone. He listens.

"Maybe it brings back memories I'd rather forget. Evokes the feeling of there being connections I wish were in no way related to me."

He opens his eyes. "Scully…"

"This feels too familiar, too much like what we found in Texas."

He lets out a breath. From relief or sadness, he does not know. "The Africanised honey bees, the cornfields." Her head dips. "You think that the hay farm is a cover for some sort of project?"

"Transgenic crops, Mulder. This farm grows them. They're a factor in the transmission of the virus that affected me."

"Many farms grow transgenic crops." He feels the statement of fact land upon her. A soft sigh, her body slumping slightly. Logic abandoning hope. His fingers spread across her side and he goes on. "There's no evidence of any bees." He remembers a time when something similar was said to him, how hollow and empty he felt. This time he wants it to be different "We do have crop circles though."

A spark of tension rises in her and she presses back against him. He fears her next words. "It doesn't mean there isn't a link."

"No, it doesn't," he concedes, letting his fingers lightly stroke and calm, as he would a skittish animal. "But we have to have proof. You taught me that."

"I know," she says. "I know."

She is quiet and he lets her be, lets her rest against him, allows her to enjoy the comfort of simple human touch. It is a luxury she gives herself all too rarely, especially from him.

"It just keeps coming back to me. I have flashbacks. Of being in a cold, dark place; something deep inside, growing and growing." She stops and steps away. Mulder feels his hand slip into nothingness. "I don't want to remember it anymore."

You don't have to remember, he thinks. You shouldn't have to. No one should.

But he doesn't let these thoughts pass his lips, doesn't mention her nightmare. There are already enough indignities for her to bear.

"Scully, we will ask the right questions to the right people and we will investigate this as thoroughly as we can."

She wordlessly gets into the car, barely letting her eyes connect with his. That is answer enough.

He gives his last line. "We'll come back tonight, document the scene thoroughly and get a specimen of the hay around the crop circles."

"Okay," she whispers.

He hopes that it will be and takes her back to the motel because there is no where else to go. Mind full of empty thoughts, lost chances, words unsaid which will remain so, and yet one thing he remembers, he holds to: he has not lost her yet. That is hope enough.


	4. Chapter 4

_**A Different Sort of Life 4/4.**_  
Title: A Different Sort of Life (4/4)  
Author: Wendy.  
Email:  
Disclaimer: I am not Chris Carter and never will be. It's all his.  
Summary: Mulder leads Scully off to investigate crop circles in Kansas and inadvertently the dynamics of their complex interaction. Set in early Season 6 of The X Files, just after "Triangle".  
Rating: Low on the blush-o-meter.

A Different Sort of Life 4/4

The whir and bustle of the laptop's modem disturbs the peace of the motel room. Scully looks up from reading at the desk, and adjusts her glasses as they shuffle down from their perch on the bridge of her nose. There is an innocence in the gesture that spins him back in time, to when her hair was longer, her suits were looser and there was no chip in the back of her neck. He blinks and a shorter haired Scully frowns up at him.

"What?"

He raises his head from his prone position on the bed, an eyebrow shrug quickly dismissing her question. There is no responding challenge, no pressing for an answer and she is back to her reading. An odd sense of disappointment settles over him, but he lets it go, allowing it to slip through the empty spaces and hollow parts of him until it sinks away and out of sight. The laptop's screen flares brightly as words and images fill its void. Over the slow, crawling connection the modem has afforded, the webpage has finally loaded.

He scans it quickly. Crop circles, crop circles, crop circles, all electromagnetic energy and light anomalies. Nothing out of the ordinary for this field. He wonders what he is hoping to find. Some reference to unmarked helicopters and manure perhaps? How about a big flashing sign saying "Here's all your answers, Mulder! The truth! The aliens! What happened to your sister, to Scully… and a bonus year's supply of Turtlewax!" He rubs his eyes and turns away from the screen.

"Anything interesting?" The suddenness of her question startles him and he looks at her confused. She pushes her papers onto the desk and stands up. "No earth-shattering theories on crop circle formations and its links to a higher power?"

He shakes his head and points to an artist's impression of an UFO shooting a beam of light onto a field. "Not unless you count Beam Me Up Scottie's rendition here."

She shoos him away from the bed, taking his place in front of the laptop. He crouches behind her, peering over her shoulder. "Well." She takes a deep breath. "That's certainly an impressive beam."

He chokes down a smirk. "Nothing like my flashlight."

She pushes the laptop away from her, colours and words becoming dimmer in their shift from the overhead light. "I was just reviewing the paperwork we need to file to Kersh. It would appear that Mr Colwyn checks out. Thoroughly."

He waits.

"Mulder, I'm saying that we have no legitimate reason to stay."

"Since when has that stopped us?" She clears her throat, looking sideways at him. "Okay, me," he corrects.

"After all the warnings we've received, the rope we have around our necks…" He watches her hands trace the pale skin around her throat, winding and constricting. "Is this worth jeopardising our careers for, jeopardising getting the X Files back? I need to be sure."

"What happened to your big theory? To trusting your instincts?" His words come out in a push of irritation, little breathless bombs that fall upon their target with deadly accuracy. She stands and steps away. He feels instantly guilty, angry with himself that he has allowed himself to selfishly plough headlong into the well of her pain. He softens and releases the guilt. It will not serve him now. "Listen," he says. "This morning you were so certain that Colwyn is hiding something that you were hellbent on finding any inconsistency you could to pin on him. What's changed?"

She looks at her feet. No amount of his stare makes her look up. "I can't let personal issues prejudice my judgement on this."

He joins her in standing. Her eyes stay on a downward course as he moves closer, sliding honey-like into the tight whorls of her personal space. "So don't make it personal. This is about the work."

"Since when-" and she stops, eyes arced up sharply, directly into his gaze. "This can only be about the work."

A pause. Breath caught for a spinning moment as he focuses on the crystal ball held upon her face, hoping to catch a glimpse of what the future will be. He reads the indeterminable in her eyes and is no closer to understanding what she wants or where he fits in. He goes on the only thing he knows. "So we stay?"

A step back and she is freestanding again. "We stay."

The trill of his cell phone interrupts. He answers it.

"Fox Mulder," crackles a male voice. "Hello again."

Eyes quirk up, stalemate forgotten. He is possibly about to encounter something very, very interesting. Scully approaches and hovers beside him. "Again? Do we know each other?"

"Yes," the man responds quickly. "I suggest we meet. There's something I have to share that may prove enlightening."

Something about the forced precision of the language pulls at a memory. Formal, clipped, yet strangely tentative. He has never heard this voice, but he recognises its rhythms from the many emails he has exchanged with its owner. "Is that Hurst?" he asks. There is no immediate answer. Target sighted. He puffs a loud impatient breath. "Okay, Hurst. Enlighten me."

"Meet me in two hours at the pre-arranged meeting place."

"Wha-" The line clicks dead before Mulder can speak. He drops his cell phone onto the bed and sinks down after it. "Looks like interesting just got less so," his dry mumble lost to the scramble of hands on face. Another wild goose chase is all he needs.

Scully's voice cuts through. "Who's Hurst?" His mouth opens but she does not pause to give him breath. "Don't tell me. He's your reliable source."

"And he'll be very reliably meeting us in a couple of hours."

"In a dingy diner somewhere, I bet?" He shrugs. "Maybe one day we could actually rewrite the cliché of dark and mysterious and try clean and decent."

"And spoil my fun, Scully?" Her lips become a pressed pout. "Come on. It's a cup of coffee. Almost as good as dinner and a movie, if you throw in my scintillating conversation."

"Mulder, if that's your idea of a good date, you're way out of practice."

He nods. "Probably."

"I didn't mean…." She is tentative, looking at him softly. There is something indistinguishable flickering among the concern of her half-turned lip and wide eyes. Panic rushes and he raises his hand to cease her apologies, letting his fingers curl up into his palm. She accedes, picking up her things on her way out through the connecting door leading to her room.

"I'll see you later."

A quiet echo and her voice, her presence, are gone. He turns off the laptop and waits for two hours to pass.

The diner is brighter than Mulder expected. Scully glances at him, face held carefully neutral before she avails him with an uplift of eyes and chin. He opens the gambit.

"Not bad, huh?"

She picks a table and slips into a moulded plastic seat. "Well, Mulder, I have to say I'm almost kind of impressed."

"Almost?" Odd disappointment settles upon him as he seats himself opposite her. The word takes on proportions it usually would not, his mind still ruminating on their earlier discussion. He was hoping they would return to their old form in the elastic band resilience their relationship has always shown in the backdraft of any rift or disagreement. "Almost" now seems a subtext for what is wrong between them, for the words and thoughts neither of them can unsay. It as if their bond is becoming saggy and overstretched, something lacking that he can't quite put his finger upon. An awkwardness remains that neither of them can shift. How many times will he wish today that he had never mentioned the word "date" to her?

Her eyes slide slyly towards him, as she folds her hands into her lap. "Couldn't give it up that easily."

Opportunity is afoot, a gap he has to fill, and he delivers with a practised almost wink. "That's what all the good Catholic girls say."

She freezes him with ice cold eyes but a shimmer of smile is about her lips. He allows himself the victory of a semi-reaction and leaves her to her silence. It is somehow more interesting to him to sit and watch as she rearranges the salt and pepper shakers to sit in a neat line either side of the bowl of sweeteners, the distracting game of a woman bored and in desperate need to kill time without talking to her companion. Their stock of easy banter and small talk has temporarily run dry.

He thinks about what it would be like to get dinner with her when they weren't on a case, weren't lonely or too late to get the company of anyone else. For them to just talk and eat, drink and laugh, and argue over who gets the bill. To do something normal and utterly alien to his life, to their life. Would it be so hard to step out of the shadows, to stop worrying about the endless twists and chases and dangers of life, to let go, to just be Fox Mulder again? Whoever he is.

Odd slivers of his time on the Queen Anne return to him, memories or hallucinations he does not know. Scully in a red dress, hair up in a thirties do, attitude unmistakably frosty and taking no crap. He has never seen Scully in a going out dress; he doesn't even know if she owns one. Probably she does. That's a woman thing, like shoes and purses. He imagines the type she would wear, something elegant and simple, form fitting with just the slightest hint of cleavage to offset the formality of her attire. To remind herself that first and foremost she is Dana, she is a woman with wants and desires, a woman who could lead a normal life. He sees flashes of this in her work clothes, her personality and confidence styling the suits tighter, the shoes higher, all while she becomes more solidly encased in the archetype that is Scully. Tough, loyal and formidable. His partner, Mrs Spooky. It's one hell of a label to heft through life, through the hallways of the FBI. And she does it with a quiet authority that silences any naysayers or critics. That makes them regard her with a grudging respect. Because of her, he is not quite a lost cause. Because of her, he still wants to believe. In something, anything or nothing more meaningful than being an empty hollow man in an even more barren life. Samuel Beckett doesn't speak to him any more than T.S. Eliot. Even if he believes in channelling, he is beyond the wisdom of dead literary greats now. Sitting in a diner, waiting for the next big tip off, the latest sign that will either damn him or save him, or leave him hopelessly, eternally adrift in a limbo with no answers and no truth. He has only Scully for company in this peculiar version of purgatory and for all his fears and nightmares, he is glad she will share the burden another day.

For reasons not entirely clear to him, this has become her quest as well as his. To know the truth, for more than the whys and hows of what they did to her, what they took, for more than justice, has enflamed her. His ideals, his motivations have somehow enmeshed with hers, growing into something independent and fierce that will not die. Because he cares, because he believes so passionately and blindly, she continues with him to see this journey through, to make sure they reach the end of the path to the truth intact. She is his one in five billion and there is no one else who could take her place.

The door clatters open and he looks up, catching her eye as he does so. She is anticipatory, keen for the mystery of the source to be revealed. The path she is taking leads to the familiar, safe and solid ground on which he knows where he is. He follows her.

"The moment you've been waiting for, Scully."

Her lips catch in a reluctant smile before she switches her attention to the man approaching their table. Average height, skinny, wispy dark brown hair and in his early thirties, dressed in a dark anorak and loose, faded jeans. This has to be Hurst.

"Thanks for meeting me," Hurst says, ducking his head down as he sits beside Scully. Mulder notices that she gives Hurst an appraising glance, as if she is quantifying the weight of evidence of his worth. Hurst presses his lips together, pensive, eyes fixed upon his hands. Hiding something, the more suspicious part of Mulder's nature supplies. He tries to dismiss it, but the nagging feeling remains.

"You must be Dana Scully," says Hurst quietly, hands gesturing towards Scully, but his eyes never leaving their downwards slant. She nods and looks away. She's uncertain and Mulder feels no easier.

Hurst looks up and his eyes pincer Mulder's. "You are getting yourself into some seriously deep water with the lines of investigation you're pursuing."

Annoyance flares in Mulder. "What do you mean?" Hurst's watered down eyes remain blank at the sharp hiss of Mulder's voice. "You asked me to come here. You led me-". Scully frowns. Mulder quickly corrects his mistake. "You led us into this investigation. Now you're reading the riot act. What kind of crap are you trying to pull here?"

Hurst leans in close. "The real question should be what are you and Miss Scully trying to pull?"

"Who are you?" Scully speaks sharply.

"My name is Trevor Hurst. I'm a member of the local MUFON chapter." Mulder looks at him impatiently, but Hurst remains unhurried. "Our focus is scientific study, and in this case we are specifically concerned with crop circles, not government conspiracies."

Mulder's mouth opens, angry bursts of emotion tussling to burst through, but Scully slides in quickly, cool and composed, leaving him in her wake. "Need I remind you, Mr Hurst, that not only am I a scientist, but Agent Mulder and myself are experienced investigators. We proceed based on the evidence in hand." She lays her hands flat on the table, watching Hurst's arrogance flail as her response has its slow and calculated impact. She draws herself upright in her chair, preparing her final damning statement. "If your opinion of Agent Mulder's investigative skills is as high as your pursuance of him would suggest, I recommend that you allow him to continue unencumbered."

"I cannot be connected to all of this!" Hurst stares at her, pure panic in his eyes. "None of us can."

"Who's us?" Scully asks.

Hurst stands up, determined to make his exit. "I think we've talked enough."

"No." Scully's hand is now poised upon his arm, like a claw ready to snap into its unwilling victim. He stills. "You can't just come here with BS and doubletalk and expect us to roll over and play dead. We deserve answers here."

Mulder places his hand over Scully's, ready to release Hurst's arm from its grip. "Let him go, Scully." Her mouth twists, eyes flicking to his, as Mulder watches her struggle to make sense of his actions. He knows that she will not understand but he sees something that she doesn't, senses something that she can't: Hurst is a dead end. And they have chased around in too many circles for too many years for him to lead them into yet more of the lies.

"Mulder."

She says his name quietly and it is all the warning he needs. He takes away his hand without argument, all fire now launched towards Hurst. "He doesn't know anything."

Now Hurst looks at him, indignation blaring. "I know more than you'll ever realise."

"So why get us involved?" Scully's sharp stare cuts into Hurst, laser-like in its intensity, her hand now firmly clutching his arm. There is anger there and something else. Mulder feels the urge to reach out, to reassure but something about her makes him hold back and wait. Crowding would be unwelcome now.

Hurst shakes his head. "Some things just shouldn't be uncovered. The cost is too high. We just care about the science."

"And we only care about the truth." Scully's hand snaps from Hurst's arm and on the ricochet, Hurst steps away, his face creased and crumpled. He eyes Scully.

"Miss Scully, I don't wish to get into an argument with you. Please, just leave this alone. Go back to Washington and continue with your normal life."

Scully shakes her head. "You know, I think Mulder's right. It's all just a big act, luring us out here, arranging this cloak and dagger meeting. You're out to discredit us." A bitter smile twists at her lips.

Hurst's eyes drop to his feet. "None of this was an act."

Mulder feels an anger in him begin to itch. The pure impudence of this man is unbelievable. His hand clench at his sides. "So tell us about the helicopter, about the crop circle? What the hell do you want from us?"

Hurst shrugs, a light, blasé movement and Mulder cannot contain himself. Hurst flinches as Mulder's face comes within inches of his own, seething, ready to explode. "I want an answer from you, Hurst." Mulder looks back at Scully, who is watching closely. "We both do."

There is a pause, a slight puff of breath from Hurst's lips as he shuffles back from Mulder's intense glare. "Then you better come outside."

They follow him into the street, Hurst walking towards a back alley a few yards from the diner, his nervous glances to his surroundings almost theatrical. The late afternoon sun is fading slightly now, a slight chill coming to the breeze which ribbons through Scully's hair. Mulder wishes he could touch her now, soften the severity of her face, the quick precision of her walk, but there is no room for gentleness here.

Hurst presses himself into the alley, and for a moment Mulder thinks about turning away and saying "screw it" to it all. Yet a little part of him, ever hopeful and single-minded, will not let go. He touches the small of Scully's back, briefly, the slight pressure guiding her onwards without resistance.

"I am part of a group who is trying to protect the future study of this UFO-related phenomena," says Hurst. "What you are doing is seriously jeopardising our integrity as an organisation and any covert support we have from higher up to continue without interference."

Scully shakes her head. "So what do you call interfering in our investigation?"

Hurst's face becomes grim. "Legitimate damage limitation."

Mulder feels his patience wavering. "Hurst, just tell us what we want to know. I'm tired of this BS."

"You shock me, Mr Mulder. I thought you more than anyone was dedicated to seeking out the truth and understood the delicacies and complexities such an undertaking requires. Yet your behaviour in this case has proven you are reckless and foolhardy and we have had to take measures to protect our ongoing studies."

Scully fixes Hurst with a hard glare. "The helicopters… you and your organisation were behind them? Or someone linked to you?"

"Yes," Hurst answers quickly. "You and your partner have no idea how much trouble you could cause. Perhaps, Miss Scully, you are becoming a malign influence on your partner's reasoning. I am well aware of how personal passions can cloud the waters."

Mulder swallows the rising hysteria which Hurst's comments have caused – Scully the malign influence? That has to be a real turn up for the books. "Hurst, you're out of your mind," Mulder snaps.

Hurst takes the challenge. "Really? Very different to what I have seen and heard. Miss Scully's lack of objectivity here is stunning."

Mulder's patience is now so thin that he can virtually feel it stretching threadbare between himself and Scully. Yet he does not worry about himself. She is the real danger. "So please go back to your butterfly net and leave us to the real work," she says, her voice tight. "When we need fairytales and another goose chase, perhaps you could bother us again then."

Mulder lets out a long breath of admiration. She is deadly. Hurst's bluster has been well and truly deflated. Scully casts a frosty glower at him as she prepares her final shot.

"The truth, Mr Hurst, is that you're just a pathetic little man who gets his kicks from making up stories."

Mulder moves closer to her and his hand drifts to her shoulder, comforting and reminding her, I am here, I am on your side. He watches Hurst leave and doesn't try to stop him.

"Agent Scully, I believe that you just solved our case."

Neither of them adds the words "at least the parts we can solve". One look between them completes the conversation and nothing else needs to be said.

~~

It's late evening now and they're back at the motel. Mulder had insisted on dinner and both of them had decided that a change of scene was needed, so they had found another small-town diner. Scully had half-picked, half-played with a paltry looking salad while Mulder had made small pickings with his steak. But they had talked. Kind of. Not about the case, not about Hurst or how he had led them chasing monsters with butterfly nets. Instead they had returned to the subject of Mulder's recent dip in the Sargasso sea, of Scully's mad dash to save him and the endless sceptic-believer dance had begun all over again.

Mulder grins at the memory and wonders when they will have to slip out of the reverie into the harsh light of truth. That again they have ran into nothing but smoke and mirrors - black ops helicopters and amazing crop circles are nothing for them to go on. Nothing they haven't seen before. In the end, it doesn't hold a drop of water and he doesn't need Kersh to tell him that. The truth is still out there, definitely not here.  
But still he wonders about the many unanswered questions. As he knows Scully does too. He can walk away from Kansas, leave this part of the puzzle for now. If it is connected to the bigger picture, he will figure out how. That simple faith maintains him.

Scully stretches and yawns. "Mulder, I'm beat."

He flops down on the bed. "Me too. It's been a long day, huh?"

"Yeah." She smiles at him. "I guess we should both get some sleep."

He nods and waits, expecting her to leave, but she does not. Instead she sits next to him on the bed, letting her arms sprawl out towards him. Their arms brush against one another and make the barest of contact.

"Scully, are you okay?" he asks.

"I'm fine." Her typical answer, then. He looks at her for a moment, trying to eke the truth out of her. She smiles at him, lightly, but reveals nothing. Cryptic Scully is no huge surprise, he thinks philosophically.

"Let's watch a movie." He deliberately keeps his tone neutral.

She reacts with mock-horror at his suggestion, snatching the remote controls and hugging them to her chest. "Oh no, not some alien-chaser black-and-white B movie?"

"Nah, I was thinking of Thelma and Louise," Mulder guffaws. "Now give me back the controls, Scully."

She holds the remote controls out, her expression contemplative. "Only if I get Brad Pitt."

"Brawn over brains! I am shocked." Mulder may be putting on a show, but he is genuinely intrigued by this revelation of Scully's hidden penchant for pretty boys.

She draws the remote controls back. "Hey, those are my terms."

"Fine," he concedes, taking the remote controls from her. "Anyway, Susan Sarandon is hot."

Scully glances at him, curious. "You know, Mulder? You surprise me."

"Why?" This conversation, he thinks, is taking some interesting turns.

"Well, I would have pegged you for Geena Davis."

He gazes at her, feelings crackling in his system that he has long tried to control. He has to be careful now, oh so very careful. Lightly, gently, he proceeds, but he has to say this. It's nearly bursting in his chest. "Smart is sexy, Scully."

They stare at each other, and it's suddenly as if all the air has been sucked out of the room. One sudden touch or a move in the wrong or right direction, and everything could change, could turn on a penny. Are they ready? Mulder doesn't know, he's not sure if he cares, but it's okay, because Scully is grinning at him.

"You have good taste," she allows and then nudges him. "Put the movie on, Mulder."

He puts the TV on and some movie comes on, that is neither alien chasing or chick flick, but some action adventure they both settle for. She leans into him slightly, and he instinctively knows that she won't see the end of the film because she is sleepy and won't be able to stay awake.

He doesn't mind. Time with Scully is a good thing. They have tomorrow for being serious and staid. Tonight he can pretend they are two normal people watching TV and let his head and heart run free with the possibilities. He can imagine a life that is different for both of them.

Who knows, he ponders, maybe one day they will get a normal life?


End file.
